How to spend less on fruit & veg

[hairRaising]

I want to cut spending on fresh fruit and veg but not sure how.

Haven't got a car so use bus / walk to local supermarkets and put food in buggy basket.

Tried a Morrison delivery recently and got the wonky range, but the pears went from rock hard to rotten overnight, the bananas were bruised etc so it seemed waste of money as chucked a lot away.

Any ideas please?

Frozen vege
Frozen blueberries are excellent - brilliant in porridge or on/in pancakes

Big bags of frozen

Second frozen veg and berries.

Fresh , whatever is on special offer that week. I find tesco basics fruit and veg just as good . And they usually have something on offer for 49p. Eg this week punnet peaches or punnet plums. They did have bunch of bananas for 49p last week.

Have you got a local market? They often do big bags of mixed fruit and veg for a £1 at the end of the day.

Don't suppose you can go to a supermarket half an hour before it shuts? I got a big tub of grapes for 29p last night

Second local market - went this morning with wallytrolley and got a double the amount I'd have got in a supermarket for the money. Even cheaper later when they're packing up, but a lot of nice stuff is gone by then.

Late night supermarket shopping can throw up some bargains, but often it needs to be used quickly.

And obviously buy what's cheap - white cabbage and carrots for coleslaw a whole lot cheaper than rocket and asparagus!

Thanks everyone for all these ideas, much appreciated.

We've got a local fruit stall that sells everything in a bowl for £1, but it means you buy 4 aubergines that all need eating within 24,hours :)

The fruit on weekly offer is a good idea, thanks

Re frozen veg - has anyone got tips for frying frozen onions / peppers please and also how to cook frozen broccoli so it tastes nice? Cheers!

4 aubergines that need using, make dip. A Venezuelan friend of mine makes this dip and it's amazing. Really smoky and great with crisps or spread on toast. You can freeze it. I'll copy and paste from the recipe she sent me.

Cook two or three aubergines that are thin so that they cook better, with their skin, directly in the flame. (gas hob)

Once black, they are left to cool and the skin is removed, it does not matter if there are pieces left as this is what highlights the smoked flavor, place them in the blender and add:

Salt to taste, pepper, the juice of a lemon or lemon and a half depending on the size and enough oil to liquefy and that is with cream texture, it is added seeing the texture.

Test at the end and correct the salt.

I use a greengrocer, fruit and veggies last 3-4 days so allow for shipping twice a week and use Saturday market

When strawberry are 89 p instead of £1.50 and weigh the same, taste better it’s worth it. Cherry tomato 29p and avocado 3 for £1, cherries, grapes all at least 59p cheaper I can save at least £5 per week

I also keep a couple of large summer fruits or winter berries in the freezer for breakfast

You can also grow rocket and other salad leaves incredibly easily in a window box. So you can get your fancy salad leaves pretty much free.

Also if you buy coriander cut - stick in a glass of water - like flowers- then pop in the fridge, they last longer

You can batch cook onions (I really like caramalized onions but they take too long for every day) and then freeze them in muffin trays. Once frozen, remove and keep in a ziplock bag. I do tons (10-15 onions at a time) at a time when I'm doing batch cooking and thus in the kitchen anyway. There's loads of fresh veg you can freeze yourself - I often freeze cabbage (chop and briefly blanche) as it tends to go off before I can finish it. You can freeze root ginger too - just peel and put it in the freezer and grate it frozen when you need some. I'm also quite into picling veg as a way of zinging up salads but that might be a step too far for what you're looking for!

As well as rocket, radishes and courgettes have turned out well for me in window boxes.

Loving all these ideas, thank you!

Can you grow any?

Buy it tinned or frozen

Are you near any of these lidls? www.lidl.co.uk/en/Too-Good-To-Waste-15447.htm

They're doing a trial of 5kg fruit and veg boxes for £1.50. My store puts them by the till. I got a punnet of grapes, cherry tomatoes, multicoloured cherry tomatoes, organic tomatoes, 3 peppers, 3 carrots, a bag of apples, a bag of mini oranges, those flat nectarines and speciality plums.

I've frozen the tomatoes whole for use in soups/tagines/chilli, chopped and frozen the carrots & peppers & I'm eating the rest. I had to throw out 2 cherry tomatoes & an orange for being manky. Might stew the plums. Might not. They would freeze for use in crumbles or pies though.

Make califlower cheese, you can add broccoli, cooked potatoes, sweet peppers, sweet potato, carrot etc

Soup!

It's worth doing some investigating to see if your area has a community orchard. I recently discovered my town has three! The fruit will be free.

Am also a big fan of freezing - if you over-buy, just blanch and freeze the veg. Fruit can be chopped and frozen too.

Also, grow your own beansprouts for stirfries etc. Use mung beans - you can just use the normal ones sold in the indian food section of the shop, if they sell them. You don't need to buy beans specifically sold for sprouting. Lots of guides online about how to sprout beans successfully. You'd need a jar - you can use a large clean jam jar with a cloth over & an elastic band, or invest in a sprouting jar with a washable draining lid. Beansprouts - which are quite pricey & go off super quick - will now cost pennies per portion. And they are quite nutritious. And it won't take up windowsill space, it's actually better grown somewhere fairly dark, as light causes the sprouts to grow bitter.
Oh that reminds me - speaking of rocket - if you do decide to grow this, for goodness sake don't let it flower. The bloody stuff is like a weed, you'll need to buy a flamethrower to get rid of it all, & it's fertile as anything...

@fluffycloudland Those boxes sound amazing, thank you! I will definitely see if I can get to a participating store. Is there a certain time of day? I imagine they would go fast? £1.50 for 5kg is amazing

Hmm, growing rocket etc in a window box sounds lovely but I have always been notoriously bad at keeping even basic plants alive, really don't know what I do wrong 😖😕

I think I'm going to try getting the Lidl box plus getting some £1 bowls of fruit/veg from street stall and then trying to blanch and freeze them.

Will report back but all other ideas please keep them coming! Cheers

@wilderness Just searched online, sadly no community orchard near me but I wonder if allotment s ever sell their veg cheaply? ...

The best saving I've made is to refuse to buy strawberries more than once a week, when they are from the uk only.